Sweden

On October 13th of last year I left for Sweden. With the nine hour time difference, I arrived in Copenhagen on October 14th; then Peter and I crossed over the Baltic Sea on "The Link". It definetly feels like a year has passed. That part doesn't seem surreal. What seems surreal to me is that I spent 10 weeks in a place I thought I could only dream about. Although I'd been to Europe five times previously, EnglandFranceSpainItaly just seemed like your standard American abroad fare, almost Disneyland-ish. Wonderful and enriching to visit those countries, yes, but somehow not exotic.

Scandinavia always seemed like an entirely separate entity to me, as though further north implied being further along to some kind of promised land (my inner compass has always gravitated north rather than south). One of my icebreaker questions when I hosted Dinner with Friends events was "If you could travel anywhere, where would you go?" I remember the first time I put the answer on my own name tag, I had chosen Australia. I remember writing that in with a bit of a shrug like, yeah, sure, I'd like to go there. The next time I used that icebreaker / name tag question I thought about it more carefully and put 'Scandinavia'. It's funny what I pictured when I wrote that. I saw cottages on snowy hillsides and northern lights and tall, beautiful blonde men. I think I pictured Norway first, then Sweden.

Once again Scandinavia seems out of reach. Although I'm thrilled to have seen Sweden and have spent a few hours in Denmark, I never made it to Norway even though it was only a five hour drive away (I remember Peter's friend Kirsten offering to let me drive her car. Always a nervous person I stammered "Oh, thanks, but I've never driven in a foreign country." She shrugged and said "Green you go. Red you stop."

I have no idea when or if I will go back to Sweden. I miss the North Sea and the autumn leaves and the windmills. And of course I miss Peter. We have moments when we talk on the phone or online and seem to remember how strong a connection we have. But there are other times when we don't have any contact at all for up to three weeks at a time. And I never hear the words "Jag alskar dig". Not nearly as pretty as the French "Je t'aime", but hey, I'd love to hear them anyway. I don't know why the Swedes even have such a phrase in their language. Maybe they say it to their children.

If it doesn't work out with Peter, maybe I can meet a Norweigan man online...
I know, I'm crazy.